FORT SMITH --Following 3½ years of delayed trials and multiple mental evaluations, a man who shot himself in the head twice after police say he killed his ex-father-in-law is mentally fit to stand trial on a capital murder charge, a psychologist has concluded.
After a mental evaluation given in early December, clinical psychologist Melissa Dannacher concluded in her report filed Jan. 26 in Sebastian County Circuit Court that Michael Underwood can understand the legal proceedings against him and assist attorneys in preparing his defense.
Underwood is charged in the June 13, 2013, shooting death of Michael Allen Shook, 63.
"In light of the facts available to me, Mr. Underwood currently possesses an adequate rational and factual understanding of the proceedings against him, and his ability to rationally assist in his own defense is intact," she wrote in the report.
Circuit Judge James Cox said in a letter last month to attorneys involved in the case that he would hold a hearing sometime in April on Underwood's fitness to go to trial.
According to case records, Underwood had been divorced from his ex-wife Angela for a year but continued to contact her, watch her house and investigate the company she was keeping.
The night before the slaying, her father phoned her and told her to stay away from the house because he had seen Underwood driving around the neighborhood. Early the next morning, police say, Underwood broke into Shook's home in south Fort Smith and shot him to death as he lay in bed.
Underwood then went into another room, sat in a chair and shot himself behind the right ear. The bullet did not penetrate his skull and he fired again. That bullet entered the right side of his head and lodged in the left side.
The bullet caused extensive brain damage but left Underwood alive. He underwent surgery and spent months in the hospital before he was transferred to the Sebastian County jail to await trial.
Cox ordered Underwood to be discharged from the jail in October 2013 and moved into a nursing home. In March 2014, he was transferred to Spiro Nursing Home in Spiro, Okla., where he has remained bedridden and partially paralyzed.
Prosecuting Attorney Daniel Shue said in a 2015 interview that he was reluctant to dismiss the murder charge against Underwood because he has to consider Underwood's criminal responsibility in Shook's death.
Dannacher's report is the first time since Underwood was charged in 2013 that a doctor has determined that Underwood has the capacity to proceed to trial. Another doctor, Bradley Diner, said in an earlier evaluation that he didn't think Underwood could ever be mentally capable of being tried for his former father-in-law's death.
Diner maintains that opinion, Dannacher said in her report.
Despite other doctors' opinions that Underwood's mental deficits were substantial and permanent, Dannacher saw improvement.
In an interview in his nursing home room, which was decorated with hunting and fishing memorabilia, including deer heads mounted on the wall, Underwood at first had trouble answering questions about his memories of events surrounding the death and other things, according to the report. He had answered those questions in interviews with others, so Dannacher thought he was feigning amnesia, the report said.
As they talked about other things, such as his children and the deer heads, Dannacher wrote, Underwood was able to tell several detailed stories about the children and his hunting experiences.
"Mr. Underwood did not become overly emotional nor did he appear to be in any acute distress," Dannacher wrote. "He was able to remain focused for several hours without complaining of pain or fatigue. His thought process was logical, coherent and goal oriented."
State Desk on 02/04/2017